Horse 1061 - St Mary McKillop... why?

News this weekend broke that Mary McKillop has fulfilled the relevant criteria for canonisation as a saint. This post is broken into two parts:

Part A - The Serious Bit.

Not being a Catholic myself, I find the whole question of sainthood somewhat perplexing. Was this the Catholic Church trying to wedge itself into the pantheon of existing Roman life? The theory goes that you can pray to whatever saint for this or that and they will intercede on your behalf, notwithstanding the fact that dead people are dead and can not do anything, and thanks to Christ himself, the curtain was opened and Christians come to the Father through him - I am The Way, the Truth and the Life, no man comes to the Father except by Me.
Doctrinally it simply makes no sense.


There is of course the blatantly obvious question of just what is a saint in the first place. The usual Greek word for "saints" in the New Testament is the word Hagion, which roughly translated simply means "the Holy Ones". Ephesians 6:18 is an exhortation to keep on praying for all the saints, which if you were to believe the Catholic Church's limited rendering of the word would imply that we are to pray for those people who have been canonised as a saint.
This also doctrinally makes no sense.

Even the word "saint" itself is derived from the Latin "sanctus", from which we get the word sanctify and all related words. Sanctification by definition is being set apart for some special use. The letter to the Hebrews (10:10) again implies that this setting apart is common of all Christians and not just those selected by some internal church process. "And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all."

It seems to me that this whole business of canonisation is a bit silly. On the other hand the idea of having heroes and people to look up to probably is a good idea. Society generally has heroes like Don Bradman, George Washington, Winston Churchill, David Beckham, Ludwig Van Beethoven etc and whatever, but the idea that you can pray to them and expect some sort of result is preposterous.

Part B - The Not Serious Bit.

Admittedly the whole idea of "Sainthood" and that you can pray to them is ridiculous, biblically flawed and utterly stupid, but if we absolutely must must must make Mary McKillop a saint, it stand to reason that she should be the patron saint of something.

St Honorius is the patron saint of bakers and confectioners. St James is the patron saint of judges... and David Jones city stores... and Newcastle United Football Club. St Martin is the patron saint of drunkards (how appropriate that the Commonwealth Law Courts in Sydney be between St James Station and Martin Place). St Christopher is the patron saint of travelling. St Andrew is the patron saint of old maids. St Erasmus is the patron saint of seasickness... etc etc etc.

It follows that St Mary McKillop should be the patron saint of something uniquely Australian, like the Barbecue, so that your snags could be done properly instead of burnt on the outside and raw in the middle. Perhaps she could be patron saint of the Hills Hoist, to make sure that it doesn't rain on your washing, or birds don't do their business on it.
No, on reflection there is only one thing that St Mary McKillop should be the patron saint of and that is football, meat pies, kangaroos and Holden cars. Let's face it we already have the hymn to go with it. And let's make it a public holiday, because that would be traditionally Australian, having a public holiday for things no-one cares about... like Labour Day, or Queen's Birthday... or Christmas... er... hmm.